Someone You Love (AMBW)

Chapter Three

"Is that my child actually making her bed?" I turned to look at my mom who walked in wearing matching pajamas and hair tied up in a scarf. She had on a shocked expression with her hand over her mouth just to add on to the dramatics.

"Do you want me to stop?" I raised an eyebrow at her to show I'm testing her patience. "Because I can."

She frowned and took the corners of the sheets from me then bumped me away with her hip. "You're tucking them
wrong anyway. You're supposed to do the nurse tuck. Shows professionalism and tidiness."

I rolled my eyes as she got to work on my bedding. "You always find a way to take some action in my life despite rarely being in it at all."

She then snatched the pillowcase from my hand and stuffed a pillow in it. "I work so this little get-up you have going on with your friends can keep going. Do you want to even go to college? What about just having basic experiences like traveling with your friends and having an actual house to fall into when I die."

"What about time with a mother? Things that leave impactful memories in my life. I can't tell dad everything."

In one swift movement, she pulled me down to sit on my bed then took her spot right next to me. We've had these many talks before but each time it leads to no change. Just another conversation about me being ungrateful and unhappy.

"You can't tell him about things like boys or periods? Which is it?" I rolled my eyes at her. "Come on. Your father has three older sisters and he's beaten up a guy for breaking one of their hearts. You know he'd do the same thing for you. He's here for that part of your life and you know you can also tell me anything whenever. Call me while I'm at work and I'll take a year off to listen to everything you've got."

"Dad is also a white man who gets cold feet whenever I tell him about racist jerks at school. He's there for the "raise the daughter" routine, but what about the "raise a black daughter" one? He's not fully there for that and as a black woman, you should understand the amount of excluding I feel."

"Where is race coming from? Did something happen today?"

"That stupid party with all my friends who are socially acceptable!" I dropped my head in my hands as I tried not to cry about what happened just an hour ago. "All this time I thought I was fitting in when I was standing out."

I felt the caressing of a soft hand on my back which ultimately calmed me down. She then pulled me into a hug as I fought the urge to cry into her shoulders. This was a rare moment and it made me feel whole.

"What happened at the party, Tahlia?" Her voice was serious and I knew I had to tell her. Unlike my dad, she didn't back down from a conversation especially when it involved me on the verge of tears.

"Josie has this friend. You know Cory. Pretty sure I've talked about him maybe once or twice. Well... Josie and Tonya really like him. We played this game where we chose who we would kiss out of two people. He couldn't decide between Josie and Tonya so he said both." I pulled away from the hug to look her dead in the eyes. "Between me and Erikkson... he said he'd rather eat sand."

My mom sighed while softly sliding her hand down my hair. "Are you telling me he's racist because he didn't want to kiss you? That would make him homophobic too because he didn't want to kiss Erikkson either."

"Well, when I asked him why after the fact... he told me he wasn't into... my kind of people."

She looked at me and her expression never changed. Still concerned and still confused at the same time. She then turned to look straight ahead where my poster of an old band I used to like was hung.